Wicca

by James Follett

  `Ah, Adrian!' Prescott went forward shook Roscoe's hand as the cult leader and his party entered the lobby. `Sorry about the short notice. Didn't know myself until an hour ago.'

  `The witch is here?' Roscoe demanded, his ice chip gaze sweeping the lobby as though he expected to see Ellen hiding behind a potted plant.

  `She will be, Adrian. She will be. Right everyone. We seem to have a few minutes in hand so we might as well spend it discussing how we're going to deal with this skullduggery.' He moved towards the courtroom door.

  `Sir!'

  Prescott paused and looked questioning at the blackshirt.

  `I'm very sorry, sir. But we had no idea that you'd be needing the courtroom.

  `Nor did any of us. What's the problem?'

  `The cleaners have shifted all the furniture out. They've sanded the floor and they're now sealing it.'

  `That's awkward,' said Prescott.

  `It's no problem,' said Vanessa. `The conference table is still set up in your office, Mr Chairman. We could get everyone around it comfortably.'

  `Excellent idea, Miss Grossman.' He beamed. `Always ready with a solution, eh?' He turned to the blackshirt. `Send the councillors up to my office as they arrive, please.'

  The party headed up the stairs.

  Chapter 88.

  `READY, MR HARVEY?'

  `Okay, Charlie. Let's go.'

  Gus ran down the lane of torches that marked the airstrip. When the all the brands were burning, Evans started the microlight's engine. It was already warm so it was running smoothly after a few seconds. He returned Charlie's wave and opened up. As before, he marvelled at the smoothness of the grass runway, The little biplane unstuck after 80 metres and he began a fuel-conserving spiralling climb, the blazing torches of the runway dwindling beneath him. The plan was leave the torches burning so that they provided a reliable reference point.

  He levelled out at 3000 feet and had less difficulty picking out the key features of Pentworth than he had feared. There were enough lights flickering in windows of houses to mark the lines of the principal streets.

  He set course and throttled back. The wind noise dropped so he switched on his broadcast receiver and jammed the earphone more tightly into his ear. Radio Pentworth was playing Beethoven's Pastoral. As always when he heard it, the gentle, lilting music conjured childhood images from Walt Disney's Fantasia of brash male centaurs and coy female centaurs gambolling and frolicking across an idealised Hellenic landscape. Pentworth should have been like that. God knows it had had the chance: clean rainfall, a marvellous climate, fertile soil, and a small but balanced, industrious population with more than enough land and skills to support them. They could have created a Utopia but they had opted for hell. God-willing, everything would change after tonight. He prayed that people would see sense and that there would be no bloodshed.

  A tiny point of light below near the dull sheen of Pentworth Lake caught his attention. Lovers perhaps. Or maybe a couple heading back from the Temple of the Winds. The ancient legend that babies conceived on the sandstone outcrop were singled out by the gods for special favours had gained even more credence recently. Of course, those who disdained such nonsense were the same people who listened to the horoscopes that Radio Pentworth churned out each morning.

  Still losing height, he swung east until Market Square was on his port wing and about a kilometre distant. He banked hard left, not increasing power so that the turn cost more height, and lined-up on the distant Government House. It was the largest building in the square therefore easy to pick out. Too easy because it was the only building with electric lighting -- the number of windows with lights on was not to his liking but Government House staff had a reputation for being profligate.

  It was three minutes to midnight. Losing height a little too quickly so a shade more power and ease back the control yoke.

  The music was still coming through his earphone. No time to switch it off. Besides, the Pastoral was a piece of music he loved.

  The flare that burst into the sky cost him his night vision, but it was no longer needed such was the brilliance of the artificial sun it created over Pentworth. Rooftops passing underneath were too low. More power, more yoke, and then he was perfectly positioned at the right height, trading that height for speed at the right rate, Government House swelling rapidly dead ahead. The girl and boy centaurs now pairing off, dancing joyously together.

  The microlight continued losing height as it flew over the dark, silent streets. Evans estimated that was about level with the top of St Mary's spireless tower. It was as planned when he had spent hours pouring over maps, calculating rates of descent.

  The Pastoral's gathering storm. The centaurs anxiously eyeing the fomenting black clouds that hid the sinister workshop of Zeus, waking now, and the biplane droned on towards its target.

  A minor god tended an anvil upon which he forged white-hot lightning bolts with a mighty hammer, and tossed them to his master.

  Market Square now 400 metres dead ahead. Zeus clutching the glowing bolt, peering down, looking for targets.

  The biplane's fixed main gear undercarriage cleared the distinctive chimney pots of the Crown by two metres. Evans increased power and put the nose down. The Durand swooped low across Market Square and climbed as he hauled back on the yoke while piling on the power.

  The windows of Prescott's office were zooming straight at him. He aimed for the centre window. No time to worry anymore about the lights being on. He yanked on the toggle to fire Rocket 1. It streaked away, trailing fire from its sustainer, sagged a little and then picked up when its main rocket fired. Rocket 2 next and then 3 and 4 together as he jerked their lanyard toggles simultaneously. The launch tubes were arranged in a slight fan pattern so that at least one of the rockets was reasonably certain to smash through a window.

  Zeus hurled his first bolt at the ground. A terrible flash, a clap of thunder, and the terrified centaurs scattered.

  The first rocket hit the front of building below the target windows and zoomed crazily up the facade to explode against the roof parapet. Evans didn't see what happened to the second rocket such was his shock when he saw that there were people in the Prescott's office, appearing at the windows. Roscoe, Prescott -- Faraday opening a sash. And a woman! The second rocket had glanced off the roof and hurled itself spiralling madly into the night with the third rocket chasing after it.

  Zeus now crazed with jealousy and hatred. Bolt after bolt crashing down. The terrified centaurs rushing hither and thither to escape the terrible onslaught from the demented god.

  The shock of seeing people delayed Evans' reaction for a vital second as the last rocket found its target. It punched through the centre window and exploded in Prescott's office as though the wattage of the lights inside had suddenly increased a thousandfold.

  Zeus was running out of lightning bolts and time as the sun struggled to regain its supremacy. It drove back the black clouds of Zeus's workshop, shrinking them with its returning warmth.

  Government House was suddenly a formidable cliff racing at Evans with awesome certainty. He opened the throttle wide and hauled frantically on the yoke. The engine screamed, the biplane hung onto its propeller as it climbed steeply.

  Another 20 to 30 horsepower and another 1000 revs and the tiny aircraft would've made it.

  Its main gear hit the roof parapet. The biplane seemed to hang poised in mid-air like a children's mobile for some seconds before crashing down on the roof. The propeller chewed into hundred-year-old frost-weakened roof tiles. A flying hip bonnet, the biggest of the roof tiles, killed Harvey Evans instantly. The microlight somersaulted, the engine broke away, flailing petrol as it crashed through the roof's tile battens and ploughed into the mountains of dust-dry bat guano. They were a century's accumulation of beetle husks -- more than just a fire waiting to happen, but a fireball.

  Zeus was finished. He yawned and drew around him the blankets of his black storm cloud bed.

  Within seconds the enti
re roof space of Government House was ablaze, engulfing the wreckage of the Durand. Its tailplane broke away. It slithered down the roof and tipped over the parapet, fluttering lazily to ground, passing the windows of the blazing office.

  Zeus found a tiny lightning bolt in his bed and tossed it out with casual disdain.

  It fell to ground just as Radio Pentworth went off the air.

  Chapter 89.

  VIKKI WAS WITHIN 200 METRES of Pentworth Lake when she heard the microlight passing overhead. She paused to stare up at the black sky. There was nothing to see. Only the angry buzz of the little air-cooled engine to mark the aircraft's passage. She wondered why Mr Evans was flying at night again. The sound seemed to be heading towards the faint lights of Pentworth. She felt a sense of foreboding and shivered.

  Vikki!

  `Yes -- I'm coming.'

  She resumed her journey but her pace lost its certainty. Why was she here? What could she do? Her footsteps faltered when the grass gave way to sand. She could hear the gentle lapping of the breeze-stirred lake.

  She concentrated on the words, `I'm here.'

  No answer.

  `I'm here!' Was it possible to think louder?

  The sharp yap of a vixen answered as though it had read her thoughts. She flashed the feeble beam of her torch along the black line of the water's edge. Doubts assailed her. Perhaps she had dreamed that she had been summonsed to the lake? She would have to return to the cave and face Ellen and Claire in the knowledge that she had compromised their safety by venturing out. The darkness was almost total and she suddenly felt very alone and afraid. Her torch suddenly dimmed. Shaking it caused it to brighten for a few seconds, and then it went out for good.

  This time her mounting sensation of dread caused her to call out, `Hallo! I'm here!'

  `Who's that?'

  Vikki gave a gasp of fear. The voice that had answered was very close, male, deep with a strange, resonate quality. She wanted to turn and run, but without the torch she would be certain to fall and injure herself. She preferred not to think about the terrible consequences of being caught in daylight with a twisted ankle or a broken leg. The radio station had reported that Pentworth House was offering a huge reward for her capture.

  Suddenly a faint glow suffused the lake. She wheeled around and watched the rocket climbing into the sky above Pentworth. It burst into a brilliant white light that seemed to hang motionless in the night haze. At this distance the light it created was the equivalent of a full moon.

  `You must be Vikki.' Trinder had no idea why he said that -- the words swam into his head.

  Vikki's head snapped around and her eyes went wide with shock when she saw the figure of the man standing not ten metres away. His jeans, sweat shirt and anorak looked uncomfortably tight, as though they had been made for a smaller man.

  Recognition was instantaneous. He was the tall, regal figure of a hundred daydreams. `Dario!' she exclaimed.

  She will probably call you Dario, they had told Trinder.

  `Is that my name?'

  It is now, they answered. Her name is Victoria. You must call her Vikki.

  Trinder was confused. One part of him was saying that the girl was a stranger, another was saying that he knew her.

  `Hallo, Vikki.' He smiled and held out his hands.

  Vikki rushed at him and threw her arms around him. His body felt hard and unyielding as she remembered it. `Oh, Dario... Dario... I knew you would come. I just knew.' `Look.' He pointed.

  She turned and gazed at the sudden orange-yellow glow that permeated the haze over Pentworth. It grew brighter by the second. They could see flames leaping into the sky, silhouetting intervening rooftops.

  Vikki reached up and kissed the man she knew as Dario, tracing his finely-sculptured aristocratic features with her left hand as she had done on another occasion. When she touched his lips, his incredibly white teeth parted to gently grip her fingers, drawing them in, sucking slowly while pushing the tip of his tongue between her fingertips, melting away her reason.

  All Vikki would ever be able to recall of the next ten minutes was the divine moment when she threw back her head and uttered a primeval cry that was neither ecstasy or pain, but triumph.

  As they dressed in silence, Vikki became aware of a mounting sensation of joy. It was almost the same feeling of euphoria she remembered when her new hand was growing. But this time there was a difference; this time pictures formed in her mind with a vivid, almost frightening clarity of what was happening to her body. She saw a huge globe surrounded by millions of wriggling, tadpole-like creatures, their tails lashing furiously. One broke through and the cell divided instantly into two cells. They, in turn, became four cells, swelling rapidly to maintain their size.

  And 4 were 8... Then 16... 32...

  They heard the harsh crackle of distant gunfire.

  64... 128...

  `There is much to be done,' said Dario softly.

  256... 512...

  The hundreds of dividing cells in her body would become thousands... The thousands, millions...

  Together the couple walked hand in hand towards the orange glow that was lighting up the sky.

  THE END

  The final book in this trilogy is The Silent Vulcan.